Many/most French museums have a "carte" that you can buy. These cards give you access to the museum without waiting in line. This is a huge benefit if you've ever tried to enter the Louvre or the Musee d'Orsday.
Other benefits that are less attractive but still important are things like a discount on food in the museum cafes, discount on purchases in the bookstore and usually docent-lead tours.
If we're in Paris for a long time, it's nice to "pop over" to the Grand Palais or the Louvre for an hour or two without thinking about it. One time, on a really hot day, we went to the Louvre mainly for the air conditioning. It was a Sunday in early Summer and very crowded, but we found a nice, vacant section of the museum and spent the day in absolute calm and cool.
You can go as often as you like, without waiting in line, without making a reservation.
At one time, I worked out the break-even on each card (individual price vs. number of times we went) and found that we saved a little bit of money and a lot of time by buying the card.
This year, I found that the card for the Grand Palais (called Sesame) has a new twist, they've added the Musee du Luxembourg to the card and called it Sesame +. For a mere Euro 22 more than the normal card, we can both go to this museum as often as we like. This is a great addition because this museum is close to home but normally very crowded. If we are holding the card, we can simply "pop" in when we see that there's no line.
Another exciting first for this year -- to buy the card on-line, you have to provide a photo. This year, my new computer has something called Photo Booth, so I just snapped my photo and downloaded it for my card. It isn't too bad, much better than the booths in the metro.
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